


Rapunzel, Revisited

by jalendavi_lady



Category: Rapunzel (Fairy Tale)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-03-09
Updated: 2013-01-14
Packaged: 2017-10-13 06:25:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 25
Words: 11,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/133994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jalendavi_lady/pseuds/jalendavi_lady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A revisit of the classical fairytale of Rapunzel, featuring the latest heir of the damsel-rescuing Charming dynasty and a tower-dwelling damsel who doesn't think she's in distress.</p><p>The violence warning is for the Briar Scene present in the original fairytale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by [](http://cereta.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**cereta**](http://cereta.dreamwidth.org/)'s [post about the then-upcoming Disney version, "Tangled"](http://cereta.dreamwidth.org/770067.html). (If it wasn't for the fact A Disney Version always muddies the copyright waters, I'd be writing this offline and trying to sell it under my real name.)

A long time ago in the land of fairytales, a man lived with his wife at the edge of a small town.

It wasn't much of a town. Not a single noble lived there - and you have to be pretty low in the land of fairytales before your town doesn't rate at least a seventh son of the seventh prince of the realm. Folks got by as best they could with what the town could do for itself.

The man and his wife had been trying to have children for years, unsuccessfully. They had nearly given up when the witch who lived beyond the far side of town, in the deep woods that no one much ever passed through, heard of their plight.

Now, in the land of fairytales there have always been three kinds of witches. There are the herb-witches, who know all about the healing and not-healing properties of everything that grows in forest, glen, or garden. There are the good-witches, who use the supernatural to make things more as-they-ought-to-be.

And then there are the bad-witches, who don't think about much beyond their own twisted noses. (Inner ugly, like inner beauty, has a way of working its way to the outside in the land of fairytales.)

This witch was, while not the worst that even lived by any means, clearly a bad-witch.

She made the couple a deal. She knew exactly what it would take for them to have the children they had always wanted, and her only price for the service would be the first child born. No success, no payment.

They expressed trepidation at this offer, for after all she was clearly a bad-witch.

"I want a child just as much as you," she explained, "and at my age, what man could give me one? If a son, I will make sure he knows the ways of the forest, both its beasts and its trees. If a daughter, I will train her as my own apprentice, and let her chose the path she wishes to take."

That was a very hard offer to consider turning down, as the couple had only a small plot of land and an offer of such a good apprenticeship was very hard to come by in their town.

And so the deal was struck, and when the first daughter was born the woman named her Rapunzel for the lettuce she ate to make the herbs palatable, and the witch took her to live in the woods beyond the town as soon as she had been weaned.

The man and his wife had other children, and whenever they did think of their eldest daughter, it was only to think of what wonders she must be learning and how lucky she was to have been given the chance.


	2. Chapter 2

Little Rapunzel had about the best childhood a girl being raised in the woods by a bad-witch godmother could have. She knew how to tell the speed of the seasons' turning by the birdsong outside the cottage before she was seven, and knew each bird by song nearly as soon as she could talk.

She knew how to see where a rabbit has a hole, and how to get him to trust you enough to come say hello.

She learned how to read the books of lore in the cottage, and learned to never ever try to open the locked upper cabinet where the bad-witch kept her most advanced texts.

She learned all the plants by name. She learned what was safe to eat and what was not. She learned how to numb a scraped knee and which herbs would make a poultice to heal it.

And, as she grew, the inevitable happened. She began to be her own person, and the bad-witch saw this.

When Rapunzel turned twelve, the bad-witch could stand the signs of the separation-to-come no longer.

Being one who never cared for much past the end of her own twisted nose, she fixed up an old crumbling guard tower not too far away. She turned the uppermost chamber into the grandest bower a young woman could wish for.

There was a lute and a harp for her to play. An entire wall was nothing but bookcase, and the bad-witch carefully traded as little effort as possible for enough poetry and books of songs to fill it. There was an easel, and paper, and a box of marking-pencils.

There was a larder-box.

And there was a window tall enough for a man to stand in it without stooping.

The bad-witch sealed up all the entrances and exits to the stairwell with heavy blocks of stone until it was as if the room on the top of the tower had always been that way.

...

There came a day when the bad-witch sat down with Rapunzel in the cottage and told her of the dangers in the world around their forest. "There are people in the village who might wish to harm you," she explained. "I've been able to defend you so long because so few would dare harm a child, but a young woman is another matter. I need you to come and let me bring you to a place of greater safety, until you are powerful enough to defend yourself."

Rapunzel had never been given a reason to distrust her godmother's words, witch or not, and of course the older woman had never cared much to tell Rapunzel that there was more than one type of witch in the land of fairytales.

And so she trusted those words, and let herself be led to the tower, up a rope ladder, and left there with a promise that her godmother would be back to see her the next evening. And then she pulled up the ladder, as she was asked, and told only to drop it again for her godmother. No one else.

There was no fire in the tower, nor any candles. Rapunzel curled up under heavy quilts that first night and tried to be brave in the growing dark.


	3. Chapter 3

Rapunzel lived like that for the next three years.

Rapunzel made her lunch daily from food in the larder-box, and every evening her godmother returned. The bad-witch climbed the rope ladder, brought a warm meal for the two of them up to the top of the tower, and stayed until the sun began to set.

The birds came to sing with her, and squirrels leaped in from nearby tree branches to play with her as they always had on the ground.

Now, in the land of fairytales a girl's hair grows as long as she wants it, and in all this time Rapunzel's hair was growing out. Apart from her godmother trimming the ends to keep the long braided ponytail even, neither raised a blade to the long golden strands.

And so, when she was fifteen, Rapunzel's hair was long enough and strong enough to reach the bottom of the tower.

Her godmother put a hook in the wall, so the pressure on her scalp would not be as bad as it might be, and climbed down the braid that night.

And then made Rapunzel throw down the rope ladder.

Even then, Rapunzel trusted her godmother, who was of course the only mother she could remember.

If she thought for even a second that now she had no way down herself besides leaping and hoping for the best, she quickly shrugged the concern off.

And so life went on at the old guard tower on an abandoned road in the middle of the forest.


	4. Chapter 4

Now, while Rapunzel was living at the top of her tower and having singing contests with the woodland birds, another youngster of the land of fairytales was enduring his own last years of childhood.

The current crown prince of the Charming dynasty was 15 years old, and entering his last years of tutoring.

The dynasty had a long tradition of the young princes going of into the world when they turned 18 years old and not returning until they had rescued a proper damsel in distress.

There was no requirement to marry her, no matter the romantic tales that the commoners in the kingdom liked to tell at night, but it was an effective means of both giving rulers-to-be a good comprehensive look around the countryside and clearing out trouble spots.

And so the young prince was being taught everything a young prince traveling on his own in the land of fairytales might need to know, everything from mounting a horse at a gallop, to how to make fire from nearly nothing, to how to survive once a bad-witch has turned you into a toad.

He could never get an answer to the question he really wanted answered.

"What if the damsel has to rescue me?"

It was a serious question. There were rules about how to treat and not treat damsels, and rules on how to be rescued by everything from a passing princess to a retired good-witch.

There had been not one word about how to react to being rescued by a damsel who had just been rescued herself.

The tutor laughed. "Don't worry, young prince. Why would you need to be rescued by her? Once she's rescued, the immediate danger is gone. It hasn't happened in the ten generations your forefathers have ruled."

His father had smiled when the young crown prince had asked him. "You will do fine," came the kingly assurance.

The queen agreed. "Don't worry, Son. Why, your father didn't even have to leave the capital city to rescue me from my stepmother," she said with a little laugh. "You'll manage."

As the day he was supposed to go off on his own steadily approached, he remained uneasy.

Why couldn't they have just told him something, anything, rather than just laughing it off?


	5. Chapter 5

And so Prince Charming considered himself a bit unprepared the day of the feast celebrating his adulthood.

They feasted for hours on the eve of his eighteenth birthday. Once the sun set, the dancing began. The royal court danced and danced and danced, and the last dance before midnight he danced with his mother.

And then, with fireworks going off from the parapets, his father put the golden signet ring of royal adulthood on his right ring finger.

He left bright and early the next morning. Most of his birthday gifts were left behind, ready for him on his return.

The gifts he took with him were the horse his father had given him from the royal stables (the same horse he had been training with, but truly his own steed now), the small kit the palace good-witch had given him, and the riding clothes his mother had given him.

Everything else he needed, he either already owned or raided from the kitchens at dawn with blessings from the cooks.

He left his princely coronet behind. Every prince going out to rescue damsels did. They were too easily lost, and the signet rings were what actually mattered to the people of the kingdom and the royals of other kingdoms.

He rode through the palace gates, through the city streets, and to the main gate of the city. He looked over his shoulder, then leaned forward and whispered to his horse, "I guess it's just going to be us for a while, Francis."

And then they rode off into the unknown.

As he sat beside the fire that evening, Francis eating grass a few yards away, he wished he'd thought to pack a book.


	6. Chapter 6

One of the unfortunate aspects of the land of fairytales is that in order to have room for all the fairy kingdoms, gnome holes, forgotten cottages in the middle of the woods, and haunted ruins that understandably cannot be within a few miles of human villages is that there are large stretches of forested road where there are no landmarks other than the occasional ancient oak or babbling brook.

He was two weeks out from home, and Prince Charming had yet to see another human.

He had spent a few miserable rainy nights with his cloak pulled around him for extra warmth and rode through a few rainy days with the smell of wet and sweaty horse as a constant companion.

The novelty of bathing in a stream and shaving with a field kit had worn off the third morning.

He'd long ago eaten the last of the bread and was now living off of edible roots, stream fish caught by hand, and whatever meat he could catch with a rope snare.

This had, understandably, made him more hungry than he had ever been before in his life. Even when he'd been learning how to survive this way, there had always been a meal in the palace kitchens at most a day's wait away. He had never had to endure it this long.

So when he saw the dull gray gleam of an old guard tower above the trees as he settled down for the night in a hilltop clearing, it was as sweet a sight as he had ever seen.

Even if no one was there, he had a place to rest a few days. With walls!

And he could be there by tomorrow evening!

The happy thought followed him through pleasant dreams and into the morning.

He mounted his horse and began the day's long ride to true shelter.


	7. Chapter 7

It was a longer ride than Prince Charming had expected.

Even so, he neared the tower by sunset.

The trees thinned enough that he could see the top of the tower long before anyone on the ground near it could see him.

And so he saw a golden rope drop down a window in the side of the tower as the fading sunlight made the tower temporarily gleam.

He pulled on the reins, and Francis quickly stopped.

A black something climbed down it, and then the rope was pulled back inside.

Prince Charming was intrigued.

Intrigued enough that the possibility of a set of walls around him at night was suddenly the least important thing about the tower.

He went into the woods at the side of the road until he was sure that no one was coming his way from the tower, and then set up camp for the night.

When the sun was completely set, he set out down the road on foot.

Entering enemy castles to rescue damsels had been part of his training, so despite his lack of any real experience he was fairly sure no one would see him before he saw them.

It was an unnecessary worry. No one was there.

There wasn't even a sign anyone could have been there - the doorway into the tower had been sealed shut with heavy masonry. In the dark, he could barely tell where it had been. There were brambles everywhere, blocking his way to even touch the stones and look for a secret catch.

There was no sign the doorway had been used. The bramble wall that encircled the tower seemed impenetrable.

He was nearly willing to accept that the rope had been lowered and then raised by magic - he had, after all, been taught about such spells and enchantments as part of his training for this journey - when he turned back down the road towards his camp.

But then he heard the faint sounds of a melody coming from somewhere above, the sort of song a child might innocently sing in a dark room when the fire or candle went out before she fell asleep.

Only the voice doing the singing was adult, and among the most beautiful voices he had ever heard.

 _A damsel!_ The thought struck him almost as if it were a thunderbolt.

He had found a damsel.

Prince Charming made his way back to camp.

He would have to observe tomorrow, just to be sure her distress was only because of the dark of the night.


	8. Chapter 8

It was early morning the next day when Prince Charming set out for the tower.

He set out on foot again, leaving Francis tied to a tree at their camp on a long lead.

He did not want the presence of the horse to reveal where he was, just in case.

One never knew what might happen when helping a damsel.

...

He found the tower was much as he had thought the previous night.

There was a doorway, but it had been blocked up long enough that the thorny vines growing around the tower had begun chipping away at the masonry.

The thorny vines had created a solid hedge of brambles as tall as a man and as thick as a horse all the way around the tower's base.

The sides of the tower above the hedge were smooth enough that even if he'd had the proper equipment with him there was no way he could have scaled it.

"A true challenge to the valiant," his tutors would have called it.

This challenge appeared to be beyond him.

But he _had_ to rescue a damsel if he ever wanted to go home.

He settled down in the bushes surrounding the tower's clearing to wait.

Around noon, he thought he heard the sound of a harp, but it could have just been his own wishful thinking playing games with him.

...

The sun was beginning to get low in the sky when Prince Charming heard footsteps.

He stayed hidden, but watched.

A old woman - grey-haired, with a crooked nose and looking every bit what he had always been told a bad witch _would_ look like - walked up the path from the opposite direction of his camp, stood under the high window, and cried out, "Rapunzel! Rapunzel! Let down your hair!"

 _Rapunzel,_ Prince Charming thought. _I've never heard of anyone using salad greens as a password before._

A long yellow rope once again dropped to the ground.

The old woman, surprisingly strong for her age, hauled herself up with only the slightest help from her feet against the tower wall.

Prince Charming thought he heard women laughing together.

The yellow rope was pulled back into the tower and disappeared from view.

...

It was past sunset when the rope dropped again.

The old woman clambered down in the increasing darkness and walked off into the night.

Prince Charming decided that he would listen to to his father's old proverb that there was no valor without taking risks.

He waited for a long time, until the darkness grew total under the new moon.

Then, he walked up to the base of the tower, right under the window, went over every single lessson he'd ever been given on changing his voice, and called up in the best impression of the old woman he could manage: "Rapunzel! Rapunzel! Let down your hair!"


	9. Chapter 9

"Rapunzel! Rapunzel! Let down your hair!"

There was a still moment after he called out the words.

Prince Charming almost thought that nothing was going to happen, but then he saw the long yellow rope drop from high above.

He stared at it stunned where it lay on the ground.

It was... hair. Braided human hair. Yards and yards and yards of it.

Prince Charming hesitated for a moment, because there was a chance, however unlikely, that there was a damsel on the other end of the hair and he had been carefully trained to never ever risk hurting a damsel.

But he really didn't have a choice, not now, so he took hold of the rope and began his ascent.

...

It was a shorter climb than it had looked, but Prince Charming's arms were aching by the time he reached the top.

He climbed over the window's low sill and into the room.

There was a hook beside the window, and a huge knot of the hair rope was attached to it.

But the rope kept going.

Six feet further on was the head it was attached to.

The damsel who owned that head was somewhere around his age, at least so far as he could figure. She was a few inches taller than he - that didn't surprise him, he knew he had at least one growth spurt left in him - and more lightly built.

She was wearing a beautiful green shift dress tied around at the waist with a belt the color of her hair.

For all Prince Charming knew, that belt could have been made _from_ her hair.

She was barefoot.

But the things that struck him the most were the look of fear in her eyes, her spat-out statement that "Godmother was right!" and the music stand she was currently wielding as if she was the lion tamer in the palace menagerie.

The tower base suddenly seemed to be a very, very, _very_ long way down.


	10. Chapter 10

The stranger was holding out his hands. "I'm just a prince passing through looking for young women to rescue. You're alone in a blocked-up tower. It's not that hard to assume you are in distress."

That was, of course, almost exactly what her godmother the bad-witch had warned her men with bad intentions would tell her, and so she kept her music stand pointed at him.

"I'm not in distress. I have everything I need and I am perfectly safe up here."

"All right, I can see that now. I'm sorry I guessed wrong, and if you give me a chance to leave without falling, I'll be on my way."

It was at that moment his stomach rumbled, and it was a very loud sound indeed, as stomachs in the land of fairytales tend to be quite vocal.

After all, stomachs in the land of fairytales do not rumble to tell their owners to eat, but rather to let everyone in earshot know that their owners would appreciate a meal sometime soon.

And in this case the Feed Me gambit worked -- because Rapunzel had a kind heart and had, after all, spent the first years of her life gaining the beginnings of a proper witch's education in how to help others.

"You're hungry."

"There's no game, the fish have abandoned the streams, and you do not want to hear how many wild roots and tubers it takes to make a meal," he quietly admitted with something not unlike shame in his eyes.

"I used to help Godmother gather," she quietly admitted back. "It was bad enough when they weren't the only thing on the table." She brightened, setting the music stand down. "I've got some food up here. I can't give you a full meal, but I could let you have something before you go on your way."

He nodded. "That would be appreciated."

Rapunzel rummaged through the larder box after retrieving her braid from the window, carefully figuring out what her lunch for the next day woud be and then dividing it into two not-quite-equal parts.

She'd eat one part herself tomorrow, and her godmother would have no evidence that more than one person had eaten.

"Here." She passed the other, larger, portion to the prince, for even all the years alone in the tower could not change the compassion in her nature. "It's not much, but it's what I can spare."

"Anything is better than what I've been eating," he told her. "Thank you."

She watched him silently as he ate, the sky out the window growing steadily darker.

"Don't you have a lamp?" he asked her as he neared the end of the meager meal.

"Godmother doesn't like the idea of me being alone in the tower with fire," she quietly answered. "No lamps, no candles, no fireplace. She brings me a warm supper every evening and we eat together."

He nodded in understanding, seeming disturbed.

Before long, there was no more reason for him to stay and it would soon be too dark for him to safely avoid the brambles on his way down.

"What would happen if she just didn't come back some day?" the prince asked as Rapunzel got her hair prepared for his descent.

She shrugged. "I've never really thought about it. I can't imagine anything ever happening to Godmother, though, and she would never ever abandon me."

He took hold of the braid and gave her a grim smile, as if he'd just had something confirmed in his mind. "Thank you for your hospitality, Rapunzel."

"You could come back tomorrow," she suddenly offered, remembering how he'd tried to make the food she'd given him last. "For another meal, I mean."

He smiled. "Same time?"

She grinned, not understanding why. She was used to being alone. She was fine with being alone.

All she needed was her godmother and her godmother's protection.

So why did she feel the need to watch him climb all the way down her hair and then not look away from the window until he had disappeared into the undergrowth and trees?


	11. Chapter 11

Life continued that way for several days. Rapunzel would eat a tiny lunch, then wait until her godmother came. After she left, Rapunzel would split the food meant for her next midday meal and give it to Prince Charming - she learned that much of his name the second night - as soon as he arrived a half-hour later.

Prince Charming would depart, and she would face the gathering dark alone as she had since her first night there in the tower.

They both considered the time together well-spent.

Rapunzel got to hear first-hand of the royal balls and banquets she had, of course, only read as stories in her books. And there were wonders those authors had never dreamed of but that had been normal everyday things for the prince.

Meanwhile, Prince Charming had access to her personal library. While most of it was made of storybooks and novels - including some even he had only heard rumors of - the bad-witch had not slighted her goddaughter's education.

As he told Rapunzel of the royal life, he was memorizing page after page of edible plants he hadn't known before but had been passing on the trail since a few days out from the palace. Along with recipes using them to make the meager local game more palatable.

He greatly appreciated the food she was giving him, but thanks to the knowledge he was gaining he was sure he wouldn't get in such bad shape again.

And every night, as he walked or rode back to his camp, he became more and more certain that she really _was_ in distress.

He just had no way to convince her, and knew far better than to face a bad-witch of her godmother's strength alone.

He'd been trained too well to respect the wishes of damsels.

Even when he was sure he was ready to go on the path through the forest again, he kept coming back to the tower, unwilling to give up on getting Rapunzel out but without any idea of how to manage it.

Then, it happened.

Hungry stomachs in the land of fairytales speak to let others know they are hungry.

And in all her life, Rapunzel had never eaten less than she needed to before.

...

Prince Charming rode up the path, tied Francis up at a safe distance, and began his approach.

Since he'd started riding Francis instead of walking, he'd been able to start out when the bad-witch finished her own descent, rather than having to wait at the tower until he saw her depart.

He stood under the window and called up, "Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!"

The long braid dropped from the window, trailing onto the ground.

He climbed up.

As he entered the window, he noticed that the braid was still firmly attached to the same hook as always for the climb, but the feet of extra length hung limply against the wall.

He'd barely had time to register that when he found himself spun around in place, his arms wrenched behind him, off-balance with his feet on the threshold of the long way down.

"Dare to try to turn my goddaughter against me, hm? Dare to plan to take her far away, hm? Dare to take the food that was meant for her alone!?" The voice was loud and angry in his left ear.

"Please, I..." he stammered.

"Oh, you knew what you were doing, young and foolish _boy_! And now I've got her someplace you'd never be able to find her again!"

He cried out as she pulled his arms tighter. He tried to catch a grip on something, anything, with his hands, but there was nothing there.

"You'd better be glad it's a beautiful evening," she told him, almost conversationally.

"Why?" he asked, only half hoping it meant a reprieve of some sort.

"Because it's the last thing _you_ are ever going to see."

She shoved him forward, over the edge.

His hands fumbled, seeking purchase anywhere.

There was a sound like a scream as the briars rushed up.

And then Prince Charming knew nothing.


	12. Chapter 12

Miles away, Rapunzel was back in her childhood home for the first time since she had started becoming a young woman.

The door was barred from the outside. She had heard her godmother moving the heavy workbench across the doorway.

That had, more than anything else, been the moment she had known absolutely that her safety was not what her godmother was defending, might have never been what she was defending.

Rapunzel could not get out. She could not keep anyone else out.

She was currently at the absolute mercy of nearly everything her godmother had claimed to be defending her from when she was led into the tower.

She had the vaguest of ideas where Prince Charming's camp in the woods was. If she could get out and away...

Rapunzel shook her head, the lack of weight only increasing the anxiety. He could already be long gone from here by the time she could walk that far.

She took a few deep breaths, trying to calm down.

Her godmother would come back for her. She'd have to take a chance, and then she'd have to make a run for the village she'd only been in once or twice, long ago. She knew the road. She didn't have a clue what she'd do once she got there, but it was clear to her now that she _had_ to leave.

Only her godmother didn't come back. She didn't come back at sunset. She didn't come back at twilight.

Rapunzel lit a fire in the hearth from memory alone, and stared into the flickering light - the first flames she had seen in years.

She'd nearly forgotten how _warm_ sitting near a fire could be.

By the time the stars were showing through the windows, she began to think that maybe her godmother _wasn't_ going to be coming back tonight.

It normally takes quite a lot of time, thinking, and effort to get out of a cottage with a blockaded door.

But for years, Rapunzel's world had already contained a closed and sealed door.

And an open window.


	13. Chapter 13

There was a chill in the air.

The latest prince of the Charming dysnasty was trying not to wake up, but he didn't know why.

But even in the land of fairytales, there's only so long someone can ignore the temperature drop of nightfall.

Then he did know why.

He felt like he had fallen from a horse. Into a rosebush.

And he couldn't seem to get his eyes open.

Something with a large nose and a bad case of horse breath sniffed at his face.

“Francis?”

The familiar whicker was the best thing he'd heard all day, even if talking had pulled at the scratches and scrapes on his face.

He managed to stand with the horse's aid. He didn't think he'd broken anything, but at the very least his legs were okay.

What had happened?

And then he tripped over something. He knelt, and a moment later remembered.

It was a body, already cooling.

The scream hadn't been his. The briars had broken his fall. The bad-witch, Rapunzel's godmother, had been granted no such luck.

She had been the only one who knew where Rapunzel was now.

Alone with no one coming and no experience or training in surviving alone was far more in distress than sitting in a tower with her needs catered to daily.

He'd failed.

No, he'd worse than failed. He was a shame to the name of Charming.

No matter if he did manage to save a damsel in distress now -- and privately he thought he'd be lucky to save _himself_ in distress at the moment -- he'd carry the mark of his errors for the rest of his days.

Even onto the throne, for there was no second son for him to abdicate to in his dishonor.

“Rapunzel!” he called out. That was the one hope they both had -- for her to be in earshot, preferrably unbound.  
 _  
At least I didn't leave my packs at the camp. At least I have food. At least I have money._

He felt the royal ring on his hand, and the shame made him feel as though it was the one thing he might be better without at the moment.

“Rapunzel!” he called again.

Francis was still walking. The prince followed his lead, for there was no advantage in staying put.

“Rapunzel, please! _Please_ answer me!”


	14. Chapter 14

It was the first time Rapunzel had ever been on her own in the woods, much less at night.

Even with a lantern, it was frightening.

But there had been the chance at leaving, and she knew getting to Prince Charming was her best chance.

And if her godmother hadn't come back, there was a chance he'd figured out something was wrong and stayed away.

She had the lantern, a pack filled with food and some water, the cottage's firestarting kit, and a knife.

The old boots she'd found hurt, for her godmother's feet were larger and Rapunzel had grown unused to shoes.

She thought she heard something and froze.

Images of wolves and brigands danced in her mind.

There was a noise, closer than she thought it had been. It sounded something like a voice.

It was a voice, and the next time it called out she could recognize her name, shouted in a male voice in pain.

She didn't know what to do. She couldn't call out herself - her godmother could be out in the woods. And if she were --

 _I don't even know his given name,_ Rapunzel thought. Calling out “Prince Charming” would tell her godmother who he was and where he came from.

“Rapunzel!”

And with that, he was close enough. “I'm over here!”

It took quite a while for him to find her, and when he came into the area of forest lit by her lantern she could see why.

His clothes had rips in them, he was scratched all over, there were a few places where it appeared he was still bleeding, and his face was covered in dried blood. He was using his horse as a makeshift crutch and he wasn't opening his eyes.

She dashed over, taking the reins from where they hung draped across the saddle. “I'm here now. I don't know where we can go, I don't know where she is.”

He shook his head. “She pushed me out of the tower. She must have lost her balance...” He was shaking. “I'm sorry. She's gone. I wanted to get you away, but I _swear_ I never meant for it to be this way.”

Rapunzel felt numb. But they needed shelter, and he needed care. She could sort out what she was feeling later. “We'll head for the cottage.”


	15. Chapter 15

It was a long trudge back to the cottage.

Rapunzel pushed the workbench out of the way and tied Francis' reins to it before she helped the prince limp inside.

She almost led him to her godmother's bed, but he needed the fire.

None of the beds that had ever been in the house were near the hearth.

She quickly made a pallet of blankets near enough to get warm and helped the prince lie down.

After a few minutes of effort, the flames were dancing merrily again.

She hung a teapot near the fire and a cauldron of water over it. She had never been more thankful the well was right beside the house.

Rapunzel might not have been her godmother's helper for years, but she knew she'd need boiling water before she was done.

She started searching through the books nearby. _There has to be something about eye injuries. There_ has _to be._

"Rapunzel? " he asked from his place on the floor.

"I'm still here, she told him. "I'm not going to leave you."

 _There._ She flipped pages, searching.

Then...

 _I can do this._ The treatment for what she thought she'd find was not at all unlike concoctions she'd tended as a child.

But the water needed to boil first.

She came back over to him and knelt on the floor. "We need to get you cleaned up."

There was terror in his voice. "My eyes..."

"...have to wait. The water needs to boil. Godmother always keeps a lot of basic woundcare supplies around."

"I'm sorry," he mumbled.

She didn't respond. They didn't have the time for her to think about it right now.

 _He_ didn't have the time. Not injured like this.

Not with what the book said about eye injuries.

"What's your first name? " she asked him after she'd gathered everything beside him.

The teapot was nearly ready, now.

"Why? "

" _Prince,_ I think I have the right to request the name of the first man I'm ever going to see stripped down to his underthings. Unless you think you can clean and bind your own wounds right now."

"Promise you won't laugh? "

She kept her voice flat. "I was named after lettuce."

He managed one chuckle. "Ashley. Ashley Charming, son of King Alban and Queen Josephine."

"Ashley? "

He sighed. "My father says embarrassing names build character. And it was his mother's father's name, back before it started being a girl's name."

"Ashley's a girl's name? " She was confused. "All the Ashleys in my books are boys."

The corner of his mouth twitched. "They must be old books, then."

The teapot whistled.

Within a few minutes, she had a mug of an herbal remedy with sedative properties waiting just cool enough to drink.

"Ashley, I've got something right here that should help keep you calm while I help you. And it may help a bit with the pain."


	16. Chapter 16

Ashley didn't know how long it took to clean and dress the long scratches the briars had left behind, and Rapunzel never told him.

He lost track of time, and except when she needed him to move she was willing to let him lose track of time.

"The bruising's bad," she told him at some point. "I don't think anything's broken."

Eventually, he felt her tuck a blanket around him. "That's everything but your face." She lifted his head a little. "Drink. Trust me, you don't want to be awake for this."

The second cup, combined with the fact he couldn't open his eyes much less try to keep them open, was enough that all awareness fled swiftly.

...

"Ashley? " Rapunzel asked after his breathing had slowed and evened out for a little while. "Ashley!" She even shook his shoulder.

No response.

 _Good._

The cauldron she'd taken off the fire while she was dressing the last of his non-facial wounds was finally cooled enough, and the liquid inside was what the book claimed was the right color.

Or at least close enough for a first try that would work. She'd have to make more again in a few days and couldn't afford to waste ingredients.

Eye wounds heal fast, or at least that was what the bad-witch's book had told Rapunzel. By the time she had found Ashley, the time for preserving completely unblemished sight had already left.

But she could help the healing, to limit the scars, and hope that the tiny cuts she was sure she would find had begun healing as close to their original alignments as possible.

She soaked a cloth in the cauldron and laid it over his eyes as a warm compress, trying to get the blood to loosen.

When she finally got his eyelids open, she breathed a sigh of relief.

Yes, there was damage. Extensive damage. It would be days until either of them could tell how much vision he'd be able to use.

But unless something went wrong in the healing, he would get to keep his eyes.

 _I should have left the second night,_ she told herself, even as she knew there was no way she would have left then. _This is all my fault. If we'd just gone, if he hadn't kept coming back, if I'd just been more careful..._

It was a long night alone in the cottage, with nothing but the sound of a sleeping horse outside and a sleeping man inside for company.


	17. Chapter 17

Ashley moaned.

"I'm here with you," Rapunzel said from somewhere close by. "Don't try to get up. If you feel up to it, I made some stew. It's not the greatest in the world, but it's edible."

There was something wet on his face, and he reached up to touch it.

"It's a poultice for your eyes," Rapunzel told him as she caught his hand in her own. "According to the book, it's supposed to help them heal."

"How bad?"

"Bad enough you're going home as soon as you're fit to travel."

That scared him. "Rapunzel..."

"There's only so much food here, for one thing. I'm almost completely untrained, for another. Three, I'm being reminded of my godmother every time I turn around. And four, I don't know my way to the village, which means the road to your home is the only path out either one of us knows anything about right now."

"Anything more?"

"Unfortunately. Considering how many people used to come here for godmother's help, I don't think anyone in the village is going to be much help to you right now."

He could feel the weight of the signet ring on his hand. "If you can get me home, I can prove who I am. Do you need help burying her?"

"No. I did that while you were sleeping. My hair is still hanging there, if we want to take anything from the tower before we set out on the road."

He thought of the rare novels he'd wanted so desperately to read, but thought better of mentioning them. "Having the books I was studying on edible plants in the area with us would be a good idea."

"Then we'll get them on the way."

She fed him, and the stew was just as bad as she'd predicted.

Compared to what Ashley had been able to fix for himself on the road, it was wonderful.

She made him drink another dose of the tea, telling him, "The calmer you stay and the more you rest, the faster you'll heal."

After it had taken effect and she was bustling around the room doing something Ashley couldn't quite figure out, he mumbled, "They never taught me about this. They said it couldn't happen..."

"What did they tell you couldn't happen?" she asked, sitting down on the floor beside him.

"What I should do if I needed rescuing by the damsel."

She patted his shoulder. "Well, no one ever told me anything about rescuing anyone, either, so I guess we're even."


	18. Chapter 18

It was a week before Ashley felt like he could be moved and Rapunzel agreed.

Luckily for them, an old wagon behind the house still worked and the harness was still in the cottage. The bad-witch's horse had been sold long ago, but Francis had been trained to harness just in case Ashley'd needed him to while rescuing - or even just helping - someone.

They loaded up whatever Rapunzel thought might be of any use, and then she helped him up into the wagon.

She led Francis to the tower, and there was a long scary moment when Ashley couldn't tell where she was as she climbed her hair and entered the tower for the last time.

She lowered packages from the window and he fumbled them loose from the rope they'd found in the cottage before she pulled it back up.

And then she climbed down herself. "That's everything." Ashley could hear tears in her voice.

"Are you sure?"

"Francis isn't going to be able to pull any more than this. Even if one of us walked all the way, and neither of us can do that, it's not worth the lost time," she told him as she finished loading the wagon.

She helped him climb back in. She'd insisted on keeping the poultice on his eyes, and claimed she'd put enough supplies in the wagon to keep the treatment up for the entire journey. She'd also insisted on setting a pallet up for him in the wagon.

He heard her climb onto the driver's seat. "So, the path you came up leads straight to your city?"

"Yes. No branches, no forks. Just follow the road."

He felt the wagon start moving under him.

...

They slept in the wagon that night. 

Rapunzel claimed the edge of the pallet - more than an edge, once Ashley realized what she was doing and gave her a bit more space - but had her own blanket.

There was an embarrassing moment as they were settling in when Ashley accidentally touched her while adjusting his own blankets and realized instantly he'd fumbled somewhere he shouldn't. "I'm sorry... I didn't..."

"You're functionally blind," she reminded him, but he could tell she was shaken. "You couldn't have known."

"Should have been more careful..."

"Godmother raised me on stories of dangerous men," she told him. "But I think I can tell the difference."

Francis whickered nearby.

There was a shuffling as Rapunzel searched for something.

"Hmm?"

The sound of a book opening. " _In The Court Of The Motley Dukes._ Chapter 1: In which we meet our heroine."

Ashley smiled, almost laughing. "You brought the books."

"My favorites, and those you kept staring at. I figured we'd go crazy if we only had each other for company along the way." She shifted how she was sitting. "It was the eve of midwinter, and Gloriane had been helping her mother prepare for the feast all day. There were cooks to oversee, and the sheer terror of watching her father's jester dance on top of the ladder while he was hanging holly branches on the walls..."


	19. Chapter 19

Ashley had claimed the journey to her tower had 'only' taken two weeks.

Two weeks on the road came and went, and by his count of streams he'd crossed on what days, they were barely a third of the way there.

Rapunzel was worried. 

The food supply was holding up, and she'd found plenty of wild things to supplement what they carried along the way.

There was plenty of water, and she'd packed enough canteens that they still retained a surplus every time they came to or crossed a source of clean water.

The supplies for the poultices were lasting with no risk of running out, even if it did take another month.

She was worried about Ashley. It had already been three weeks, and the book had made it very clear that the sooner he was in the hands of a properly trained witch who had experience in medicine beyond stirring a cauldron at someone else's command, the better his eyes would be when they finished healing.

The way they were going, it would probably be two months after the injury before anyone but she could even examine him.

They could have made better time without the weight of the books, but there were some nights when they were the only things that lightened the mood. Even now, Rapunzel couldn't bring herself to lighten the load that way.

And in the back of her mind, she knew that the little warning in the book about the healing speed of eyes meant that the poultices probably weren't even doing anything now.

She didn't tell Ashley that. She didn't tell him how fast eye injuries were supposed to heal.

She just kept drugging him to insensibility before switching the poultices twice a day, so he couldn't consciously know how good or bad his sight was now.

So he couldn't tell _her_ how badly she'd failed him until they reached the end of the road.

And as the days went on, she had the feeling he had come to the same conclusions anyway. Whether he had or not, he didn't try to take the poultice off after they'd been on the road a week.


	20. Chapter 20

Two months since he'd been completely free from pain.

Seven weeks since they'd set out on the road.

And it was nearly nightfall again.

Ashley knew from the count of streams that they had to nearly be there.

Rapunzel gasped in the driver's seat. The wagon ground to a halt.

Ashley chuckled. "I take it the city is nigh, fair damsel?"

"You live there?"

"In the big building on the hill. Inside the second ring of walls."

"But... the stories..."

He laughed, then turned serious as he realized just what her reaction meant.

He'd been hearing her favorite books for over a month. He knew she'd been exposed to just what a castle could be. "You thought I was the prince of a vassal king, didn't you?"

"Yes," she squeaked.

"I'm not. You never heard the name of the king of the realm?"

"No. Our vassal king is King Stephan the Lesser. The village doesn't even rate the seventh son of his seventh son, why should we ever be noticed by the king of the realm?"

Her voice was high, fast, and increasingly squeaky.

"Rapunzel, it will be fine. You don't have anything to be afraid of." He lay there for a moment. "Can we get there tonight, or will it have to be tomorrow?"

"Tonight," Rapunzel said, voice still shaky. "It will be late, but the sooner we get you to someone with training..."

Even now, the mutual deception was still holding strong.

The castle good-witch was going to have a _fit_.

"... the sooner we can be sure you didn't miss anything."

Some of his ribs still hurt, and he was sure that not all of the bruises were fading yet.

Even if he couldn't see them, he could still _feel_ them. It was one of many reasons he didn't complain about never leaving the pallet on the wagon for long.


	21. Chapter 21

Rapunzel had never in her entire life seen anywhere as large and imposing as the capital city was.

Even the castle proper by itself looked to be overwhelming, and there were miles and miles yet to go through the surrounding fields.

Ashley stayed quiet in the wagon, blankets defending him against the evening chill.

 _The closer we get before we have to answer any questions, the better,_ Rapunzel reasoned.

The walls kept getting closer and closer and larger and larger.

Night fell and the moon rose.

She could see the torches on the battlements and framing the gate. They grew larger and larger until she could make out the individual flames, and then the individual soldiers patrolling the wall in the darkness.

And the closed city gate.

"Ashley, the gate's closed," she whispered in fear. "What do we do?"

"I'll handle it," he told her. He laughed a little. "I think a prince can return to his own city whenever he pleases."

"But it's not _your_ city," she hissed. "It's your father's. And I'm just a..."

"Damsel a prince rescued and who rescued him in return. Nothing to worry about."

She still wasn't sure.

...

"We're there," she whispered back to Ashley when they were only a few minutes away.

Francis slowed to a walk and whinnied in greeting.

She could hear Ashley fumbling to sit up behind her in the wagon.

"Francis?" one of the guards asked.

Another cried out, "Halt! Who are you to have the prince's horse in harness!"

But Francis wouldn't halt, no matter how she tried to get him to stop. He was home, where there was more than just grass to eat and the people were familiar.

"She's the damsel who's been helping the prince home," Ashley joked behind her.

When she dared glance back, Ashley had his hand up with his ring clearly visible in the light.

They bowed for the briefest moment, then rushed forward.

They ignored her until one of them started untying the cloth holding the latest poultice on. "Don't! His eyes are hurt. The light..."

The next thing she knew, one of the guards had her off of the wagon, through a door beside the gate, and was marching her through a passageway inside the wall.

Away from Ashley, and away from the wagon that held everything she had left in the world.


	22. Chapter 22

"Why did you do that? Where are you taking her?" Prince Ashley of the Charming Dynasty demanded to the remaining guards.

"Just a precaution, your highne..."

"I promised her she didn't have anything to worry about. She isn't used to being around people, she's been raised on stories of marauders, thieves, and rapists, and you..."

"Apologies, your highness," said a familiar voice. "Martin, go warn the palace that the prince's new friend..."

" _Rapunzel_."

"... new friend Rapunzel is not like any damsel we've encountered before." Steps leaving. "She is your rescued damsel, I hope?" he asked in a whisper.

"Yes, she is." Ashley smirked despite his anger. "And she _did_ have to rescue me in return."

"How long have you been on the road home?"

"Weeks. She spoke true. My eyes have been covered since a week before we started out."

The memory hit him, as he had not let it strike him all through the journey in the woods.

A creaking noise as someone climbed onto the driver's seat. "Just rest, your highness. We'll have you to the good-witch soon."

...

"She was right to tell you fools to get away from him!" the good-witch yelled as she helped settle Ashley into a blessedly familiar bed. "Weeks under a blindfold except for twice a day, and you were going to stick a torch in his face immediately afterward? I should ask the king to make you all revisit your field medicine training, because heaven help your comrades in arms if your memory of it is as flawed as your basic common sense!"

"Oh!" came a cry from the door.

"Mom?" Ashley asked, without really needing to.

"Your royal majesties," the good-witch said in a much calmer voice, "it appears your son has had quite the adventure."

"Mom, you have to go talk to Rapunzel, she can't understand, she's been living in a locked" - well, it was technically true - "tower for years, they just took her away..."

She hugged him. "I'll see to her, Son. But what has happened to you?"

"Her godmother threw me out of the tower. She was a bad-witch, she'd been teaching Rapunzel some herb-craft when she was younger, Rapunzel searched through her books..."

"Someone used the crafts of a bad-witch on my heir?" his father's voice boomed.

"NO," the good-witch insisted. "I haven't examined him yet, but I can tell from the smell. It's a very basic herbal poultice, the same as any of the herb-witches in this city might make for any eye injury."

"I don't think she has the heart to be a bad-witch," Ashley said quietly in the silence that followed. "Not with how she was blaming herself for what happened. She kept murmuring about how she should have believed me sooner."

The good-witch stroked his hair back. "Quite the tale to be told, my young prince, but right now I need to see what damage has been done."

She pressed a familiar-smelling cup against his lips.

"She gave me a lot of that, too," he mumbled as he drifted off.


	23. Chapter 23

Rapunzel sat at the table in the small room the guard had taken her to.

She could hear him standing outside. He hadn't locked the door, at least not in any way she'd heard, but with him right there she wasn't about to check.

There were no windows. That made her more uncomfortable than the closed door. Being shut in a room was normal. Not being able to see the sky was frightening.

A table, two chairs, and a bed. There was a fireplace on one side of the room, but there was no fire in it. It was a warm enough night that it didn't matter.

And she hadn't been alone with a fire since she was a small child, anyway. Being alone with the torches would have been even more disturbing than it already was if the guard hadn't been there.

It was like some of the rooms in her books, the sort of rooms noble hostages were kept in.

While they were waiting for some dashing young prince or knight to come sweep them off their feet or ride into the sunset together - at least for the young women.

She'd always wondered why the young men tended to stoically endure for years until suddenly being freed upon the coronation of a new king - or a determination that they were the new king - while the women actually had some hope of getting out.

Only even women had no hope of getting out of the king of the realm's custody by those methods - what prince or knight would dare cross him, when the borders of the realm were weeks of riding away and the neighboring realms currently had treaties?

She'd learned that much from listening to the men her godmother had treated for old war wounds. Squabbling happened between the vassals, but the borders of the realm were currently stable.

But that had been years ago. She had no way of knowing what it was like now, and Rapunzel knew it.

There was a knock at the door and a pretty middle-aged woman in a plain dress came in the door a moment later.

It had been so long since Rapunzel had been around a door that was in regular use that she'd nearly forgotten what knocking on one sounded like and meant.

"Rapunzel?"

"Yes, ma'am?"

"You can call me Cindy. I need to ask you a few questions about what happened to the prince."

"I didn't mean for..."

The woman smiled. "You aren't in any trouble. Not unless what really happened is vastly different than what we think happened. He said you lived in a tower?"

Rapunzel nodded. "Godmother moved me there when I started growing up. She said it was to protect me."

"Is there any chance she might come looking for you?"

Rapunzel shook her head. "Ashley said she must have fallen after she pushed him. She died."

That was when it hit her, really hit her, in the way even burying the bad-witch hadn't made it because Rapunzel had been holding onto every scrap of composure she could for her and Ashley's sakes.  
Now...

Even with her imprisonment, even with all the things she was learning hadn't been quite right...

Her godmother was still the only mother Rapunzel had ever known.

She was still sobbing, Cindy's arm around her shoulders, when the door opened again.


	24. Chapter 24

"Josephine, if you don't help me get that girl as an apprentice I swear..."

The girl looked up, tears forgotten and her fear clearly growing. "Jo... Josephine? _Queen_ Josephine?"

She sighed. "Cindy to my friends, thank you, and anyone who can help my son as much as you have certainly counts as that to me."

"But..."

She smiled. "Rapunzel, more than a few of the queens of House Darling have been the damsels the kings rescued in their youth. Sometimes even those married later on in their lives - I grew up scrubbing my step-mother's floor, and the old king was to the point of despairing that he would never have grandchildren until I came into the family. We aren't like the royals in your books, at least not in private."

She shivered, clearly trying to believe.

"How is he?" Cindy finally asked the good-witch.

"He could be better, but it would have taken years of formal training. You really just read the recipe for the poultice out of a book?"

Rapunzel nodded, silent.

"And following instructions was the only teaching she'd given you?"

"And gathering. And understanding what watching animals could teach me in the woods."

The good-witch nodded. "Well, you did as well as my last apprentice would have done two years after I started letting her work without direct supervision."

Rapunzel looked confused.

"She means you worked miracles," Cindy translated, knowing just how good that apprentice had been.

"But I didn't have any idea what I was doing!"

"Yes, you did." The good-witch smiled. "You've been putting that poultice on his eyes for far longer than it would do any good for him."

"What?" Cindy hissed in shock.

"That and the tea kept him calm. I couldn't let him know how bad it was, not until he was home, and if I'd just blindfolded him he'd've ripped it off in half a day or less."

"Exactly, child. You did know what you were doing, and when you ran out of options for his eyes you took a care to what was happening in his mind."

"Does he know how bad it is?" she asked.

Cindy stroked the tangled odd-length mess of her hair. "No, he doesn't. We sedated him first."

"And we won't know how bad his vision is until he looks and tells us."

Rapunzel took a deep breath and her next words were full of anger. "Then if there's no more treating it, why not let him know? Why hide it when his kin are all here beside him?"

"Not more treating it the way you were," Cindy told her gently.

"But I have skills you do not. The longer the wait, the less the chance of healing eye injuries, but there are some tricks for scars on the eye that I can use. The preparation for the rest of his treatment has begun. Right now, he is sleeping in his own bed, peacefully."

"Did you really keep him dosed with sedative tea?" Cindy asked with a forced little laugh, and Rapunzel seemed to finally get the message that she was in a safe place.

"Well, I had to keep him from looking when I changed the dressings and poultices so I'd drug him first..." She trailed off. "You want me as an apprentice?"

The two women grinned.


	25. Chapter 25

The world was soft and smelled funny.

He was alone.

"Rapunzel?" he groaned.

A hand on his. "I'm right here, Ashley. We made it to the city, remember? You're home. We're both safe, and Francis is down in the stables having a good long rest."

He reached up and felt bandages over his eyes. A familiar hand forced his wrist away. "She did all she could, my prince, but I have a few tricks left in my apothecary that may do you some good. Best if you wait to look until we're sure all your options are spent, hmm?" She put a hand on his forehead. "And beyond that, bedrest until those ribs finish healing, at the very least. You're very _lucky_ you hit those brambles."

He thought of finding the bad-witch's body on the ground, the way it had felt. "I know I am."

There was a little sound from Rapunzel, and he knew she must be thinking about her godmother as well. He gave her hand a little squeeze.

She returned it nearly instantly.

"So you'll treat me as long as you think it'll do any good, and then..."

"And then you can adjust to whatever the damage is. And it won't be me treating you."

He was so used to the good-witch that he could practically see her smile. She'd only been treating him for the slightest skinned knee since he was a small child, after all. Even with that, the words made him nervous - she had, after all, said it was she who knew of treatments that might do some good for his eyes. "Who, then?"

"It will be me and my apprentice."

"You don't have one right now and I haven't been gone _that_ long," he protested. "There weren't even rumors anyone was currently qualified, not unless they were already apprenticed to someone else already."

"You're perfectly right, my prince. There weren't any rumors that anyone was qualified. And then someone imminently qualified and horrifically undertrained arrived on our doorstep one night."

"...Rapunzel?"

"Girl's worked miracles on you, young man," she told him in the gruffer tones of the village she'd been raised in before she came to the royal city and then to the palace. She shifted back into her current accent and diction. "It'd be a waste, a shameful waste, to let that kind of natural affinity for good-magic sit idle and untrained. And, given the current state of her training, I'd surmise getting her used to other people and familiar with bedside manner beyond what she's naturally figured out would be a good place to start." The smile was there again.

"We've got my books right here in a bookcase the queen ordered out of storage, Ashley. I can keep reading to you if you want me to, and I won't have Francis to steer so we can do it during the day as well. At least until you can get up on your feet. I don't want to think about what just lying in the same place all the time would feel like - at least in the wagon we were always moving."

"At least there were the birds," he tried to joke.

Rapunzel laughed.

There had been birds, and the songs had been constantly changing both as the day marched on, as the weeks moved on, and as they moved into different parts of the forest.

And he well knew that this was the wrong part of the castle for birdsong. Too far from the gardens and too high.

There was no way he was asking to leave the room like this. Not when he'd have to be carried blindfolded on a litter down stairs even if the good-witch allowed it.

The wagon had been scary enough until he got used to it.

He squeezed Rapunzel's hand harder at the thought of it. "Where's Mom?" he squeaked out before he could word it with more princely dignity befitting his age.

"She and your father the king are both sleeping, my prince. They stayed awake until utter exhaustion began to claim them. But you _needed_ to go ahead and wake up."

"There are guards at the door, just in case anything happens, and between the two of us and your parents..."

"You aren't going to be left alone until this is over, my prince."

That helped.

A little.

"Do you want me to start where we left off?" Rapunzel asked him gently.

"Sure," he told her. "That's just fine with me."

They were halfway into the chapter when the good-witch left the room, her shoes clicking against the stone.


End file.
